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Travel The MEGA Travel Thread!

I've been fascinated with the "boring" desolate Central Aisan steppe since reading the Great Game (good book about the sort of guerilla war/spy competition about the race for imperial conquest of Central Asia between the British, French and Czarist Russia.) I know Kazakhstan, Turkestan and Azerbaijan are supposed to be all "boring. desolate" steppe, but has any one had an interesting and thought-provoking experiences there?

I also read a book by an ex-Peace Corps Volunteer about the hopelessly polluted and now non-existent Aral Sea. has anyone been there and experienced this first hand? I'm sorry I don't have any picture links right now, I'll try to find some and edit my post.

But has anyone travelled there and what was your experience? I know it would be dead depressing in many ways but I'm fascinated by these sort of "lost" post-Soviet regions.
 
^ YES me too!!

My sort of dream itinerary goes as follows (all overland travel, by train whenever possible):

- Start in Xinjiang, China (exploring Kashgar and surrounding cities).
- Cross into Kazakhstan and spend a good couple of weeks or more exploring the vast country.
- Cross into Uzbekistan from the the northeast (Karakalpakstan), explore the Aral area, then zip through the silk road cities and into the Ferghana valley
- Cross into Kyrgyzstan (the most interesting place in the world for me right now) from the Ferghana area, spend at least a month community-based tourism all around the country.
- Cross into Tajikistan from the north, hang around mostly the verbotten GBAO area.

- Cross from Irkeshtam via ferry into Afghanistan, and explore the Hindu Kush area and the north of the country mostly.
- Cross into Iran and spend a good couple of weeks exploring it.

- Cross into Turkmenistan from the south, and go straight west along one of the country's 4 main roads (lol). Explore the Turkmenbashi and the Karaboghaz (if possible, probably not).
- Take the legendary ferry from Turkmenbashi to Baku, Azerbaijan. Spend a good amount of time exploring this magical country.
- Cross into Georgia and explore a bit.
- Cross into Armenia and explore a bit (especially the northern areas).

- Cross from Armenia to northeastern Turkey through Georgia.
- Explore the eastern part of Turkey, then go all the way to Istanbul.

- Cross into Syria from the remote northeast, and take the very boring trip to Damascus (which would be explored, I guess).
- Cross into Jordan from the north, and head all the way south, ending the trip in Petra.

(In a perfect world, Iraq and Israel would be included in this leg of the journey)

The trip can be done backwards, but it is a LOT more hassle than it already is (bureaucratically and logistically, especially the Turkmenistan part).

The brown part is the main trip. The orange part would happen in a perfect world, however one would likely need to go from Tajikistan directly into Turkmenistan. The blue part is the actual termination of the main silk route, although not something I'd be too excited to do. The green part is another "unusual" travel destination and one of the continuations of the silk route (the other being through europe), but seeing that I lived there half my life, I wouldn't be doing it anytime soon.

That was so much fun to write! :D I have a couple other similarly epic trips, one through Patagonia, and the other through Tibet/Pakistan/Kashmir that I'll write up later ;).

p.s. Carl, I think you've been hanging out with backpackers for far too long ;). For the majority of earth's population, Laos and Mongolia are waaaaay off the map.

p.p.s. I personally enjoyed laos, but that could be because I only spent 3 days there. I do agree with Carl though that the wats become redundant.


EDIT: here I got so excited I even made a map of it! =D

trip.jpg
 
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^That's what I'm talking about. I planned a trip of similar nature a few years ago, but got discouraged with the visa situations, and not being in my home country to apply really put a damper on things.

That'd be a dream trip, but the logistics of bureaucracies and visas would take some months to handle from one's own home country.
 
^ We ought to do it together some day... hehe. This kind of travel needs companions, if for no other reason then to symbiotically-bitch about bureaucracy ;)

I guess with proper planning one could work on the visas ad-hoc. Have you see Lonely Planet's Central Asia book? As fashionable as it is to criticize LP amongst backpackers, I find it very helpful for things like visas and transport.

I believe once you get to Kazakhstan you can get all the other visas in Alamaty. Said book lists Kyrgyz, Turkmen, Tajik, and Afghani, and Azerbaijan embassies in Almaty. There is a Kazakh embassy in Bkk, and I know there is an Arminian embassy in Georgia (the latter being visa-free). The only real headaches are the Iranian and Syrian visas, as well as all the permits required on top of the Visas. Still, it seems to be nowhere near as frustrating as Tibet...
 
Hrm, my only attempt for a visa on this jaunt was made for a Khazak visa in Delhi. I inquired about the visa, and was informed that I must have an in country host (not a travel agent or hotel), and apply from my home country or my assigned embassy. Since I'm a US Citizen, that means a trip back to the US and the search for a legitimate host for the visa.

If you know better than I, I'm up for the trip. We could start early summer, once the mountain passes open up.

When are you going to get your sore ass down this way? We need to do some diving! I saw an advert in the Post, RT on Thai was like 6000THB, not a bad price. OTOH, a 13 hour bus ride is dirt cheap.
 
Look again: 2500THB to Surat Thani with Air Asia!!

I'm sort of going through a crisis at the moment (emotional, physical (quite sick), and financial) so I pretty much cannot leave my flat unless I find a job, VERY soon...

As for Kazakhstan, the Letter of Invitation is a thing of the past as of this year. I believe only Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan require a LOI now, and that can be arranged over the net with travel agencies.

From what I heard, getting any visa in Delhi is a nightmare!
 
Very nice job on the bureaucratizing. Nice to know the LOI is no longer a requirement... makes it much easier. I don't know if the staff was lazy, or if I really do need to be in country of origin though, any ideas?
Delhi has the reputation of being a bureaucratic black hole, but my experience at the US, Nepali, and Pakistani embassies have been pleasant and easy... no real hassles. I decided to opt against using my Paki visa though, as a few days later the train exploded with hundreds dead... and all the hoopla that came from that.

I feel your financial situation... I'm in a rough spot myself. The damn PAD needs to get the fuck off the lawn of government house and go back to real jobs (I'd take 500B a day right now though) so as to stop scaring away tourists. We all know that is not happening soon though. Actually, it's not happening until the PPP undemocratically hand power to the Peoples Alliance for Democracy... but that's for another thread.

Flying to ST would be a waste, as it's still a four to five hour bus ride away, and then a two hour ferry to Phi Phi. I know AA has cheaper flights, but I refuse to go anywhere near AA ; past experiences involved taking every single last baht they could from me. I'll pay the Thai price and get my luggage along for free, along with a nice drink and a pillow, and no old man elbowing me for a spot in the line. You could fly into Krabi for a bit less than Phuket, and grab a ferry straight from the pier in Ao Nang (about 30mins from Krabi airport). That's for another day though, when you have some work.....
 
^ I'd recommend you save yourself more public embarrassment and stop posting your wisdom.

Carl: Lol @ democracy. You ought to PM me with your rant on AA. I'll definitely keep all this info in mind, and I promise we'll meet as soon as I get out of this cesspool. I have no idea when exactly the rules for the Kazakh visa changed, but I'll check :) (I'm thinking of just going straight to the Kazakh embassy and ask since I've been going to Silom regularly these days). The LP book I'm referring to is from aug. 2007. The last time I've seen mention of the LOI was on kazakhstan's foreign affairs site in summer 2006.

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Here is my second dream trip (yes, I couldn't wait) =D. I call it the "shangrila trip", hehe. Not as extreme as the first one but still interesting.

- Start somewhere in india, and go to the furthest north - Ladakh and Kashmir.
- Head south through Rajesthan and into Pakistan from the only (I believe) land crossing between the two countries in Attari.
- Skip the bs in south-central Pakistan and head immediately north to areas like Chitral and the NEFP to continue on to the Pakistani side of Kashmir (assuming politics allows any of this).
- End Pakistan in the Karakoram, and enter China through the Karakoram Highway.
- From here, one can attach some parts of my first trip, and get back to Kashgar to continue.
- At a certain point on the KH (Kashgar?) there is a road that heads south into Tibet passing through the Aksai Chin area. Apparently this is one of the most desolate places in the world.
- Go south to Tibet, making sure to explore the important (and usually overlooked by tourists) areas in the west. From there, head to Lahsa, exploring all the way.
- From Lahsa, head to the Everest Base Camp.
- After that, cross into Nepal from this city whose name escapes me at the moment. Maybe hang around Nepal for a bit.
- Cross back into India and head to Darjeeling from which you go into the Sikkim province.
- After exploring Sikkim, enter Bhutan for a day or two (depending on how many $200/day you're willing to give the Bhutanese Government) ;).

This trip would be very difficult logistically and even physically to do backwards (apparently crossing from Nepal into Tibet is too much of an extreme elevation that most people experience altitude sickness). The Chinese government is fucking shit. They make Tibet so inaccessible to foreigners that Turkmenstan and North Korea are easier to get into!!

And here is the map! ;)

Trip2.jpg


Lol, yes, I am obsessed! I shall post two other trips soon. Feel free to use for travel, though do your own research beforehand!
 
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^I take it you know about Bhutan's tourist requirements/restrictions/fees?
One way around this is to fly BKK>CCU via Druk Air and taking an accidentally long stop-over ;).

Nice to see the Karakorum pass on this route. It's a journey i've wanted to make for some time...

I'd like to go to the Peshawar market, also the market in Kashgar. I don't know about traveling through Tibet though, friends tell me parts of Yunan are far more Tibetan than any of modern Tibet. Though Lhasa must be visually stunning.

I'm very interested in spending a great amount of time in Sri Lanka at some point. My time there was far too short...

about democracy: The People's Alliance for Democracy needs a dictionary. Democracy usually means the guy with the most votes wins. I guess that's not the Thai way... though I do agree with some of the major tenants of their argument, they have lost all of my support for being wankers and totally polluting this concept of democracy.
 
Yeah apparently Bhutan is a big financial burden to get into... that's why most of its visitors today are Celebrities. I haven't researched it formally yet though, so I don't know the whole story.

Apparently the Bhutanese paint huge colourful dicks on their homes for good fortune ;)

I'm very interested in Sikkim - most people go to other places in Northern India and Nepal, but skip Sikkim. Have you been there?

Yes, a chunk of northwestern Yunnan and western Sichuan is part of the are historical Tibet, inhabited by mostly Khampas.

My problem with Yunnan is two-edged:
1. I want to benefit the chinese gvt. as little as possible (not that any part of china-proper is of any interest to me).
2. Overland would be a nightmare - few ways into and out of Tibet (with a pocketful of permits of course).

I also assume it will have too much in common with SE Asia in terms of natural landscape, ie. very very very boring, but that is not a big issue since the utterly-alien uniqueness of Tibetan culture is worth it.

Check out Western Tibet ("Ngari"). From what I read, it seems almost untouched by tourism, with most visitors being indian pilgrims. If I get in shape before heading there, I'd be very happy to try circumambulating Mt. Kailash on foot...

I find Sri Lanka marginally-interesting. As you can tell, I am not really into the tropics. I'll likely become much more interested in Sri Lanka if I go anywhere with my newfound gemmology craze.

Btw, I have very little interest in sub-saharan Africa. Maybe Ghana, Ethiopia, and Namibia, but nothing to get too interested in. To me, this part of the world represents humanity in its lowest form (I'm talking about the continuous suffering). North Africa though, I find very interesting. Haha, now I gave myself an excuse to make yet another itinerary ;)
 
Why not go somewhere quite 'normal' but make it an adventure.

In June next year me and two friends our going on our own kayak adventure before we all set off to uni.

zadartodubrovnikgd7.png


That's our map

bahiya.jpg


There's the kayak we will each be using
 
^ That sounds pretty cool! I was going to suggest that if you're Kayaking the Adriatic, you might as well start in Venice for cultural consistency (until I read your "Italy.. Booo". LOL. Btw, are you still going to Cambodia?

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Here are the two other trips I promised. They are much simpler in structure than the other two.

Siberia and N. Korea:

- Get on the Trans-Siberian railway from somewhere west of Novosibirsk. I picked Kazakhstan.
- Take the train to Russia's Altai Republic. Spend some time exploring this remote country. According to pure-land Buddhists, somewhere in the Altai Mountains is the entrance to Shambala (the pure land).
- From Atai, head to Novosibirsk (I need to check but I believe that's the nearest spot to get on the Trans-Siberian.)
- Go east on the train, possibly making stops at the main city in each Republic you go through (I heard terrible things about Tuva though).
- The main destination in this part of the trip is Lake Baikal.
- After Baikal, head down to Mongolia on the Trans-Mongolia. Briefly explore the country (what I heard is that it is fascinating but said fascination is short-lived).
- From there, do the necessary evil and go to Beijing (from what I know, one MUST arrange a N. Korea trip at Beijing.
- From Beijing, take the fastest way to whatever chinese city that was that ones go through to get into N. Korea
- Explore N. Korea. I hear it is one of the most haunting places in the world.

- In a perfect world, one would probably simply continue on the trans-siberian to Vladivodstock, and enter N. Korea from there, thus avoiding the hassle of china).

Map:

Trip3.jpg


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Patagonia

This one is pretty straight-forward, and probably MUCH less of a bureaucratic hassle. I have still not researched this one in any detail, so I don't know where one would stop exactly. The main idea is to start at one of the two capitals, zigzag one's way south the country until the very tip of South America (Ushuia). From there, move on to the 2nd country, and zigzag your way up to the 2nd capital. Worthy of note is the Falklands, which ought to be visited during the Argentina leg of the Journey...

Simplified map:

Trip4.jpg

 
carl said:
or the northern reaches of South America.

I´m in Colombia right now and I wouldn´t say it is THAT adventurous. There are places you´d have to be pretty adventurous to go but overall it is probably one of the safest and friendliest places in South America. Maybe a boat ride down the Putamayo from Puerto asis to Leticia or something would be pretty out there, go through a lot of guerila/narcotrafficante ares. I went down the Amazon from Iquitos to leticia and thought about it but the locals told me it just wasn´t worth it, f only for the fact that you´d have to take your own 15 days worth of food and water supplies. I went on a coca processing tour the other day in southern colombia, it was interestin but hardly of the nbeaten track (the fianl product was very nice though). And going into the ghettos of Medellin to score, that seemed innocent enough until we saw kids walking around pointing shotguns at each other laughing, but I guess you could see that in any big American city, no?
 
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Jamshyd said:
^ That sounds pretty cool! I was going to suggest that if you're Kayaking the Adriatic, you might as well start in Venice for cultural consistency (until I read your "Italy.. Booo". LOL. Btw, are you still going to Cambodia?


Death would be pretty much certain if we intended to cross from Italy to Croatia, we're all beginners and way out of our depth already :)

Yes, I'm still going to Cambodia :) Off this December.
I'm going to Singapore with my girlfriend for 10 days, taking the sleeper train up to Thailand, stopping off at Kuala Lumpur and Phuket, then spending a week or so in Thailand before my girlfriend flies home (she wants to be home for Xmas). I'll then spend the next 2 months travelling around Laos, Cambodia and Vietnam (most of my time will be in 'Nam where I'm buying a motorbike and seeing where the wind takes me).

And nowt wrong with Italy either, we just wanted to blow my friend's idea of Italy out of the water while we made the map
 
intercity urban america and remote natural areas in Canada are pretty cool.
 
I travel quite frequently. I am a dual Israeli/American citizen but live in the Philippines. This year alone I have been to Israel, US, Hong Kong, Thailand, Cambodia, and Taiwan in addition to the Philippines.


I have travelled most places, but have not been to some important ones (important in the sense of major destinations). I have never been to Australia (but wifey is nagging to go there and visit family), NZ, Greenland or Iceland, Tibet, Bhutan and Nepal, and some of the Arab World but then as an Israeli AND a Jew I am prohibited by (those countries) laws from doing so.

I am planning a trip, which I hope to take in the spring with my wife, to Madagascar, what looks to be a fascinating place. I have travelled many nations on the 3 costs of Africa but have never been to Madagascar. I am really excited about the possibility of going. Such a fascinating country.

While I am an old hand in East Asia, I too have never been to Mongolia and while I admit to thinking of the place, I do not see myself going at this point. The time to go would have been in the bad old commie days in my view. Now cell phones have changed the world. Unless you make contact with uncontacted tribes in the Amazon or in Irin Jaya (New Guinea) you will not find many uncharted destinations sad to say.

The internet and cell phones have shrinken the world incredibly in a very rapid period of time.

Also, while I have been to India, a couple of times, there also two places there I want to go, make that 3: Sikkim, Assam, and Andabar/Nicobar. All are severely restricted to foreigners...as is the nation of Bhutan but for the right price one can get there. To my knowledge Bhutan which is still an Absolute Monarchy (one of 2 in the world now), up until 3 years ago had not even permitted television let alone cell phones so that too might be pristine enough for my taates.

eDDe: Cambodia is one of my favourite places but you know how you always find as$hol#s who say "The time to go there is long gone,?" Well I am that as%hole. I spent 3.5 months there this year (New Years Eve until March 16th) and it was my 4th or 5th time in the country. They have made leaps and bounds to the point where it is basically unrecogniasble from just 3 years prior!


Time was when you had to travel either to Nam or Thailand to take money out of the bank or wire it! Now oif course they have ATMs and Western Unions in just about every neighbourhood in PP. Many other things have changed as well and you just might be among the last vistors to see Beong Keok Lake which they are going to fill in.

The Lake is the place where all the partying goes on and they say that once they fill it, they are going to plow under the squatter neighbourhoods on 2 of the 4 shores, including the Western Backpack mecca around St 93.

Once they do that, you might as well stay in Bangkok and BK is a shi$hole now. Since Thaskin and his maniacal "War on Drugs," courtesy of Yaa Baa they have become anal retentive hard ons. Changed their Immigration Laws, and so on. Shooting addicts to death in broad daylight!

I will say this, if you are going to the region and wish to see VERY interesting things head up to Laos. Whether you are into partying, into history and anthropology, Laos is the place. Still rather affordable as well. Cambodia was trading at 3900 Riel per Dollar when I left which is a 600 Riel deficiency and is probably at about 3200 but who can say (without actually bothering to check). The point though is that it might be very expensive if you travel on the Dollar as I used to do (All Euros now).
 
rachamim said:
The Lake is the place where all the partying goes on and they say that once they fill it, they are going to plow under the squatter neighbourhoods on 2 of the 4 shores, including the Western Backpack mecca around St 93.

they have said this for years...
I was there twice this year, and still nothing more than rumors... the same rumors Ive heard for the past two years. Sisowath has had lots of new development, with touristy diggs all the way from the palace up to the port. new guesthouses and girly bars.
The Heart of Darkness is still the best party in S.E. Asia. :D
 
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